MINUTES OF THE INFORMAL MEETING OF THE JOHNSON COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS:

JANUARY 18, 2001

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chairperson Lehman called the Johnson County Board of Supervisors to order in the Johnson County Administration Building at 9:14 a.m. Members present were: Pat Harney, Mike Lehman, Sally Stutsman, and Carol Thompson; absent: Terrence Neuzil.

BUDGET COORDINATOR JEFF HORNE: MONTHLY REPORT FOR DECEMBER, 2000

Lehman: This is Jeff Horne, our Budget Coordinator. He was going to give us an idea how our departments are performing and if there is any exceptions and why those might show up.

Budget Coordinator Jeff Horne: Good morning.

Stutsman: Morning.

Horne: We’ve reached the halfway point to the fiscal year to the end of December. Expenses and revenues of course should be at 50%. The departments are doing a really good job of keeping within their expenses. We’re only at 43% of the overall budget so far. We have a couple of departments that are running a little over. I’ll review those quickly here. The Ambulance Department, I talked to Mike Sullivan and he indicated that they’ve had some overtime and of course higher fuel costs than they expected. The Medical Examiner’s budget is slightly over budget also. They made a large jump in the number of autopsies in December, 700% of the budgeted amount for that month. But, it’s not far over budget and is still basically on course there. SEATS is running 6% ahead of budget right now. Motor vehicle repairs, maintenance and fuel, and of course the new office rent basically accounts for all of this, and the bus that burned earlier in the fiscal year accounted for a lot of the maintenance costs. It just swallowed it up right there.

Thompson: Our Space Needs plan did call for giving her the office rent out of the Space Needs budget. We had money in there to do that but she didn’t get her transfer request in, in time for the budget amendment. So, that will be remedied in the spring.

Stutsman: Pat and I met with Lisa yesterday as part of liaison supervisory visit between the Supervisor and the Department Head. She does have a plan for the maintenance and trying to get that on task.

Horne: Yes, I talked to her, too. Yes, she does have a plan and I did sit down and talked to her about her contracts and other things like that.

Stutsman: With the cold weather it’s just death on these vehicles and the fact that they are aging.

Lehman: Fuel is something that they didn’t see and I think that’s the same thing with Mike Sullivan, with the weather overtime, they’re out longer on calls, more calls with the weather and stuff.

Horne: The next is Court Services. We’ve discussed this before. Pat White has indicated they have some larger than anticipated costs for ongoing cases. It’s a very difficult department to budget for because you never know what kind of cases you are going to have. During a given year, we have witnesses back and forth etc. Veteran’s Affairs is running over budget. Leo indicated there is an ever increasing demand for rental assistance and the Veteran’s 2/3 approximately of the budgeted funds for the year have already been spent, so we’re coming up against what we’ve budgeted for Veteran’s rent assistance for the year here.

Stutsman: What’s his plan with that Jeff? Is he going to come in for a budget amendment?

Horne: He has indicated he has capped it. He has indicated he is going to need to go over. It was his feeling that in time that this would smooth itself out throughout the year and that the demand as the year went on would taper down. Most of them came in the fall and in the winter.

Lehman: By his guidelines, individuals are allowed 4 assists. He was thinking, maybe they started those 4 assist requests earlier in the year, on average.

Horne: Right. They come right away and get their need assist, usually within the first part of the year. He anticipates that will level off some in the 2nd half. Then, the last department is Nutrition or Senior Dining. It’s running just slightly over budget. That’s due to the raw food costs, which are over 15% of the budgeted amount for this part of the year. Besides that, all of them are pretty close to being on budget. We don’t have anything really way far out of alignment here, so the overall budget looks really good right now.

Thompson: Jeff, on Nutrition, you know the Heritage budget process isn’t in sync with ours. We said that we would make up some of the difference between what Heritage gave them and what their budget was, but we didn’t ever actually get that money into their budget, did we?

Horne: No.

Thompson: It still has to be amended in.

Horne: Yes.

Thompson: That should cover theirs. Our share doesn’t show up on their budget yet.

Horne: Reverend Welsh has asked me to look at a couple of things regarding their budget. So, I’ll be going over that with the Heritage and that relationship a little bit here in the next few days.

Lehman: OK. We spend their budget funds down first and then we add ours in.

Horne: I’ll move on here to an update on the Fiscal Year 2002 budget. The initial round of budget presentations has been completed now. We’re entering the 2nd part of the budget season. We have meetings set up for Monday, the 22nd at 1:00. The 29th at 9 a.m. and the 31st at 9 a.m., as well as February 6th, if necessary. You know I’ve indicated the Auditor’s Office would like to have the budget, if we can, by the first week in February. They need lead time for the publications setting the public hearing etc and getting the budget to the State on time. I have a couple of notes. Budget negotiations at the University and Dr. David White are ongoing. We’re getting closer to an agreement on a budget, or a basic agreement. I’m going to show the Board what I’ve come up with, with them pretty soon.

Stutsman: Jeff, will there be changes in this year’s budget?

Horne: No. They’ve indicated we’re going to try to live within Dr. Bozek’s budget for the rest of this Fiscal Year.

Stutsman: OK. So, this will be for 2002. All right.

Horne: This will be for the 2002 budget and going forward. Their approach is a little bit different than Dr. Boseki’s, so we’re kind of seeing how… The first year will be kind of, we’re not really sure. But, I sat down with them and we came up with the best estimates that we could. Gasoline and oil prices are likely to remain high or rise even further. Since I wrote this report, OPEC has in fact decided to cut production, so we’re likely going to face even higher energy costs coming into the next year. When we go into budgeting we should probably take that into consideration. I’m going to start working on the infrastructure schedule for the Courthouse, Administration Building and Jail. I’m hope to be able to plan out the life of the buildings and what some major repairs and systems will be. When we get a new Facility Manager in place with Dwight Dobberstein I’d like to get this wrapped up by the summer sometime.

Stutsman: Sounds good.

Horne: That’s my report for December 2000.

Lehman: OK. Thank you very much.

Carol DeProsse: May I say something? Who all does the Medical Examiner have to perform autopsies on?

Horne: He doesn’t have to. It comes as a request and then there are different regulations for the cases. It depends on the Sheriff and law enforcement.

DeProsse: Are they murder cases or are they people that die in their apartments or people that die in the hospital?

Horne: He doesn’t just do autopsies on anyone. Some of the cases (inaudible) are just a matter of the attending physician.

DeProsse: But, then is the County responsible for the costs of all autopsies that are ordered or performed by whom? Who orders that an autopsy be performed?

Lehman: It’s by Code, but I am sure there is an interpretation between the Medical Examiner having some discretion along with maybe requests from law enforcement and probably County Attorneys.

DeProsse: So, our County Medical Examiner, though, does not go to University Hospitals to perform autopsies for which we pay that are just patients that have died at the hospital etc.

Horne: When any kind of resident dies here, we bill the other County and vice versa. That’s how it works. If we have a resident of Johnson County that dies in another County, then it’s billed back and forth between the Auditor’s Office.

DeProsse: So, is any of the 700% increase, that seems like (inaudible)?

Horne: That was just for the one month. Prior to that in the year we haven’t had very many, so they seem to come…

Lehman: It’s not that large of a budget.

Horne: It’s not a large budget to begin with. It is subject to a lot of spike like that. But, if I am correct, Carol Peters, if a family requests an autopsy, the County does not participate in payment of that at all. It’s just that if the Medical Examiner requests it and a lot of that is outlined in the Code when they have to have that done.

DeProsse: Thanks.

Lehman: OK. OK Jeff, thank you very much.

Recessed at 9:22 a.m.; reconvened at 9:30 a.m.

Iowa child institute representative TED TOWNSEND: IOWA CHILD INSTITUTE presentation

Lehman: We’ll go back into Informal Session. We have scheduled a presentation from the Iowa Child Institute. We have the presentation scheduled and I know the presenters need to get to another activity, so we have not scheduled any public discussion. If you have any discussion we can do it at the end of the Informal Meeting with Inquiries and Reports. I’d like to introduce Henry Herwig, City Councilman from the City of Coralville and he’d like to introduce the participants.

Coralville City Councilperson Henry Herwig: Easy job. After we’re all technically set up here and everything. Supervisors, I’d like to thank you all for taking the time to listen to this. It’s a complicated process and proposal, so it’s important to put this (inaudible) in front of you. There is nobody better able to do that than Ted Townsend and we’ll detract from you. Let’s introduce Ted Townsend and let him take over to explain to you what this is all about.

Iowa Child Institute Representative Ted Townsend: That’s great. Thank you Henry and thanks to all of you here at the Johnson County Board of Supervisors for the time to introduce the status of this Iowa Child Project. It’s progressed rather dramatically over the last 5 years and this progress is accelerating. We’re eager to hear what you think of it and how you can hopefully help us make it better. The mission of this entire endeavor is on the screen right here. The Iowa Child Seeks to create a world class education environment that will dramatically boost economic development throughout our State. The core concept we’re describing here is we are recommending building on Iowa’s rich education heritage to develop a new level of excellence specifically targeting educational research, teacher development and in the dissemination of all this education, information. By packaging this living laboratory in a unique destination attraction, we create a powerful economic engine that does indeed ensure self-sufficiency for the educational components and remarkable economic development for our State. Ladies and gentleman, that is this project. We have another 17 slides or show. We have condensed it this morning in the interest of time. But, the idea behind this is to seize the world lead in what is arguably the most critical need facing mankind, education, and advancing the impact teachers can have in the real world learning environment. The idea is not in the first instance, to build a tourist attraction. It’s to advance the impact of the science of education to every teacher, every student, every classroom, if they want it every home in Iowa. From that educational excellence will then flow remarkable economical development for our State and this region. Some specifics; over the last 5 years, the group of us involved in this project have spent a lot of time, a lot of effort, and yes, frankly a lot of money assembling the best group of educators arguably ever put together in this State and indeed nationwide with some international influence as well. We traveled to a number of top (inaudible) facilities around the Country, 40 or so. We developed professional relationships. We brought people here in various fields of expertise. We involved the leadership in our Iowa education establishment. One of the things we are proud of in this project is it has brought the whole world of education together, which is something that doesn’t always occur. Frequently these various aspects will come in conflict with one another. In this instance, the state superintendent of schools or ISEA, far and away the largest state teacher’s union, dean’s of education, superintendents, individual teachers, parents, they’re all on the same page believing in the need for this educational facility. Specifically they make these statements. No surprises here, everybody in the world discusses the need for newer schools, a smaller student to teacher ratio and incorporating technology in the classroom and the learning setting. They all agree with that and concur and make this statement, in Iowa and beyond, a well-trained teacher in the classroom is the critical element for improved learning. Yet, teachers today are not being trained in any large scale. The modern methods of learning, the science of the mind is advancing much more rapidly than those insights and breakthroughs can be incorporated in the learning environment. No where on earth is there one facility that gathers them together, demonstrates them in the real world learning environment and then disseminates all of that education, knowledge and science out to all of the teachers on the job who need it. That is the point of this project and again, from that expertise and that position, fabulous economic development flows. The people who have come to involve themselves in this project have targeted 5 specific areas of learning that are universally required. All you have to be is a human being and you want your kids to have useful understanding in all 5 of these areas. Yet, nowhere on earth is there one full school district that successfully teaches all 5 of these things for the lives today’s children will lead in their own time. Expertise in these 5 areas is what the educators have devoted themselves to extending. The people who have participated, we won’t take the time to go through at much length. But, many of these names are recognized. Some of them you might not. They are a cross section of Iowa’s education establishment. They include top-flight experts from around the world. I might mention just a couple of these names that are not from our state originally. Dr. Mel O’Connor there, third from the bottom there, of Emery University in Atlanta. Mel, you may or may not be aware, on PBS public television a few months ago, there was a multi evening series called Childhood, two hours per night for 3 nights or perhaps 4. Mel wrote this entire series and the book that accompanies it. He is recognized as one of the experts, the very best around. He is reflective of the caliber of the people participating. There is page 2 of this group. You can see it includes the very top people in our State and beyond. These people have devoted themselves to this idea of extending education, and now does the economic development come with it. Is this a real thing? In terms of consultants who have reviewed our work of the last 5 years, most projects like this would have one top-flight consultant. We’ve used 3 independent consultants, each with an international reputation, many years of experience. This is one of them. Harrison Price is a very senior man out of southern California. He’s done over 3,000 such analysis in his professional career. Many repeat assignments for Disney. He was a personal friend of Walt Disney we were told. This is the statement he made to a study panel we’ll refer to shortly, headed by Governor Ray, that reviewed this work. A well executed entertainment program with a strong educational and visitor participation emphasis represents a complimentary and synergistic addition to the regional attractions inventory. Pays a deserved tribute to Iowa’s leadership and education and furnishes an outstanding showcase for the beauty and wonder of the natural world. I mentioned earlier, I’m going to put these both up here now. I mentioned earlier of the study panel, about a year and a half ago, the Iowa Department of Economic Development appropriated $185,000 to review the work of the Iowa Child team. We were allowed to make a one-hour presentation at their first meeting, we were then dismissed for 6 months. Governor Ray chaired that group. It had Republicans and Democrats, men and women, representation from each of Iowa’s congressional districts. They reviewed all of our first 2 independent consultants. They traveled to facilities around the country to learn what could be comparatively reflected in this project, then they hired, as I mentioned, Buzz Price, as he’s known, to do yet a 3rd level of independent study. At the end of that 6 months we were invited back. I confess to you I still have not met Buzz, but over a conference call he explained his results and that earlier quote was a part of it. The point they all make is, if this facility is built of sufficient scale, of sufficient quality, with the education focus and no debt, they all independently concur it will run in the black without the need for any ongoing governmental subsidy. That’s a breakthrough, we believe. The panel, in their 40-page report to our legislature, made these 2 points. They recommend Iowa create a multi-faceted educational facility, dedicated to the advancement of education and learning. The also recommend we build a major engine for economic development by creating an integrated complex of public attractions. A specific quote from that report, the decision to create Iowa Child is a defining moment for Iowa. Iowa must seize this opportunity before it is gone. They also make this statement, that the risk of inaction, are forbidding and unacceptable. Then, Coralville step forward with what is arguably the single best sight in all of the state of Iowa. We’ve had opportunities frankly, to take this project elsewhere and we have resisted them at all costs. From the moment we began this project we said it will be built on Iowa’s soil someplace and that has been my goal from the beginning. The site represents a fabulous opportunity for the success of this project and we believe a very easily integrated sight into the local community. You know this site far better than I do. But, the great news is it’s on the intersection of an Interstate system. The Iowa Interstate Railroad runs along the southern edge of it and we’ve had conversations with John Roy, whom I bet you’re familiar with who owns that railroad and directs it. He’s having conversations with Amtrak and we’re envisioning now railroad passenger cars painted on the outside, perhaps like frogs or sharks, fitted on the inside with science exhibits and laboratories. Kids from across the State and depending how long they choose to stay around the mid-west, can come here doing classroom experiences on their way to the facility, experience it and do classroom settings on the way home. One of the little things that come along as a great advantage to this particular site. One of the key aspects we’ve emphasized from the beginning and it’s not frankly in my opinion reflected in this image, but the idea of creating a distinctive architectural image that represents the idea. The approach would be that 5 years from today, someone would open for instance the Wall Street Journal, or perhaps an international newspaper, see a marketing piece that includes an image and without seeing any language at all, they would understand that means Iowa. Iowa equals educational excellence is a powerful and dramatic reputation indeed. It creates a distinctive first impression for people who visit the area. It allows people to get excited about the opportunities one could have living in the area. Again, the idea that the world will recognize Iowa as the newest, best most effective resource in the world of education is a very powerful, economic engine. Specifically, then, to the things this Board of Supervisors perhaps cares about the most, what sort of impact would it have on this community? Three independent analysis all have come again to the same conclusion, they don’t ever give you a specific number. You can bet it’s not any particular number they could predict in advance. But, they will deliver a range, 1.1 to 1.5 million people per year will pay to see this facility. Sometimes that sounds like a big number in a State that has less than 3 million total people. Allow me to share a few comparisons. One we’ve used frequently is, to be successful, this facility needs to draw in 365 days as many people as the Iowa State Fair draws in 10 days. Another analogy would be, as described here, sometimes the scale is overwhelming to people. It was to us in the beginning also. But, what we’ve just described here would represent the 38th largest tourist attraction in America. By complete coincidence, Iowa is about the 38th largest State. Another quick analogy I might share is what was done with an aquarium in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Ten years ago, Chattanooga was dying on the vine, becoming a classic donut community, with the inside emptying to the outside. Air servers pulled out of town, you could sleep in the middle of downtown Chattanooga after 5 p.m. and on the weekends. Further west of here in Iowa we have a community that understands this very well. Someone suggested an aquarium and was quite literally laughed at. But, led by a man named Lupton, who made a fortune bottling Coca-Cola, group went out to visit the newly remodeled aquarium in Monterey, coming back to say we cannot live without an aquarium in Tennessee. They built this facility taking 2, what at the time were frankly rather remarkable risks. The first was, Chattanooga is not on an ocean. If you think about it, nearly every large aquarium in the world is on an ocean someplace. The Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, I guess is an exception, but Lake Michigan has some water in it, too. Chattanooga is on the Tennessee River, but it’s several hundred miles from the closest ocean and people thought that might be something of a risk. Another risk they took, vastly to their credit, is they built the world’s first large fresh water aquarium. The man who runs this facility is Jackson Andrews. His friends in the industry kid him by saying Jackson all you have is a bunch of brown fish. Those fish draw one and a quarter people a year to a community that is not much larger than the Cedar Rapids area, for instance. Their whole corridor concept is probably larger than Chattanooga and several hundred thousand people drive 3 hours out of the far larger city of Atlanta every year to see this stand alone aquarium. They have very little educational focus. They of course do not have a rainforest. They don’t have the other components we’ve discussed and yet, as a result of this facility, Chattanooga is alive again. Imax theatres have been built, shops, restaurants, boutiques, air service returned, all as a direct result of this aquarium risk they took that paid off big time. I might also reflect, that the man who projected the attendance at the Chattanooga aquarium, on which they base their decision to build, is one of our 3 consultants, Thomas Martin, from the Boston area. Like all of those that he has projected, the Chattanooga aquarium opened on time, on budget and draws more people than his projections. That’s been true in every single one he’s projected. So, we think Chattanooga is a wonderful analogy. In terms of money directly, this facility will generate an extra 65 million dollars from people who don’t live in our state now, every year. Specifically in Johnson County, about 40% of that will come right here. Hotel taxes in the region, this is a boost to the existing hotel inventory. The facility that we’ve described for Iowa Child will in fact include a for profit hotel. But, this is increased hotel motel taxes on the inventory, it does not include that, that we would include in the facility to extend its impact. Specific numbers like this, again anybody familiar with the world of statistics or projections, you can probably bet your life it will not be exactly $27.9 million a year. But, rounding off, this is the range of economic impact a project like this will generate. In terms of jobs, during the construction period, 2,200 new jobs over at least 3 years. That is a one-time impact of $540 million in expenditures to build this project. There is a small multiplier involved there. I learned a little bit about this multiplier thing recently. When I was going to school here at Iowa, they talked, every economist in every class I took said the classic multiplier to be used is 7. The multipliers used in these numbers, when one is used, are typically less than 2. Sometimes they are 1.3, 1.8, 1.9. They are really babies compared to the genuine economic impact. But, with every one of these consultants we emphasize from the beginning, our approach must be undersell and over deliver. At the end of the days, the consultants go back to their hometowns, our Iowa Child team stays here in Iowa. Please don’t hang us out on a limb. The facts will not support. So, these numbers are as conservative as they’ll professionally stand behind. In terms of wages, $166 million in increased wages over those 3 years. In terms of employment, again, with ongoing operations, $120 million every year in new revenues throughout the State. That’s specifically including wages of nearly $22 million. In Johnson County alone, $44 million in new expenditures and those wages would be $12 million. These are very serious numbers for a project that carries essentially zero risk of success, or perhaps I should say zero risk of failure. On top of all these numbers, that we haven’t quantified in a slide today, but are all the tax receipts. We mentioned the hotel and motel, but income taxes, sales taxes, all go up locally and statewide as a result of the full impact of this economic activity. Further stating it, this is Thomas Martin, our 2nd of our 3 consultants. Iowa Child has the potential to be a major stimulus to tourism revenues in Coralville, Johnson County and Linn County, making a significant contribution to the areas tourism goals and economy, while educating, inspiring and entertaining both residents and visitors. It will also provide a stimulus to the Iowa State economy and support statewide tourism growth goals and initiatives. Statements like this a re not made casually by consultants of this caliber. They are recognized as the best in the world. Their reputations are on the line and they say it because they believe it. Specifically, too, what’s the remaining real question of this project, how are you going to pay for this thing? We understand that’s a key question. The range of sources available at this point we describe this way. Vision Iowa Fund. I suspect you are familiar with the existence of the Vision Iowa Fund. They have the power to invest $75 million maximum per project. We are not claiming any sort of guarantee that we’ll earn this money, but we fully intend to earn it. Governor Vilsack spoke to this group just in the last couple of weeks. While he obviously did not come right out and tell them they had to give the project the money, he did give the Iowa Child, not exclusive, but a lion’s portion of the share for creating the idea of the fund in the first place. The City of Coralville has come forward dramatically. The specific amounts of money they choose to invest is up to them of course. But, frankly, the site they’ve offered by itself is such a dramatic expression of interest in the project we’re thrilled to be sure. Public and board of appoint, private sources within our State, it’s public knowledge that I personally have offered $10 million to start this fund-raising campaign. We’re not a liberty share specifics of other private sources in Iowa, but we can tell you we’re working on that right now as you might suspect. Individuals, foundations and corporations have expressed a very solid interest and we think that within the next 6-8 weeks we’ll have some powerful announcements of others who have chosen to participate here. Outside the state, this project has remarkable national legs. Frankly, we’ve had a number of conversations with very serious sources of money at the corporate, individual and foundation level. They need an expression of support from the State and when they see that’s coming forward, they’re prepared to participate, I have great confidence there as well. Again, to the point, in terms of financing, this project must open debt free. We have never considered debt financing of any kind. There are a couple of particularly (inaudible) examples of very nice facilities around the Country that attempted to utilize debt financing. The aquarium in Tampa, Florida, is an example. They proved to the world once and for all it doesn’t work. These facilities, that’s why it’s a classic not for profit, cannot afford to service debt and debt is not a part of this financing plan. Here’s where we stand today. What we believe is perhaps the most distinguished, I exclude myself from this description, ever assembled in our State, Governor Ray is Chairman as well. Again, many of these names you’ll recognize. Jolene Frankin, again President of the ISEA, BJ Ferson, currently with Iowa Public Television’s Board I believe and former Director of the Waterloo Human Rights Commission. You know most of these names, again Les Garner, President of Cornell, Joe Lackey, of the Gazette. Here’s page 2. Norm Nielsen, again you’ll note most of these names, Ward Reynolds, the former Chief Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court, Merlin Plagge, the Farm Bureau, David Skorton from the University of Iowa, These people are not on this to kill time. They’ve come to this project and worked to make it right because they believe in the impact they can have, specifically in the world of education and in tourism. Different people get excited about different aspects of this project, but that’s one of the great strengths it has. It impacts many people positively. Here is our next step in terms of scheduling. We’ll spend the rest of the year fundraising, finalizing architectural design, the educational interactions are underway right now. In the specifics of the science design, the best people in the world are participating here. We have associates that constitute, in addition to the Board of Directors we described, an educational and what we call leadership design team. There is also one from the world of science and technology. It includes people like Dr. Ben Beck, Director of the National Smithsonian Zoo in D.C. Dr. Terry Maple, who runs Zoo Atlanta and is current President of the American Zoological Association, Ron Foreman is the past President of the American Zoological Association and he runs the Audubon Institute of New Orleans. They run 9 not-for-profit educational attractions. Chief among them the Aquarium of the America is in New Orleans. Gary Outenwreath is the Chief Biologist at the Moody Gardens in Galveston. This is a rather long list and I won’t bore you with any names you haven’t heard of before. But, the point is, the top people in the world in these various fields of scientific expertise have again come together because they believe in this project. To be perfectly direct, they don’t have the world’s greatest love for Iowa. Some of them are actually not native Iowans. They are here, because they believe in the project, not frankly because they have the great desire to impact the economy of our State. But, it delivers that impact regardless. It’ll take about 3 years to build this facility, the actual construction process and then the plants and the animals that live here will have to acclimate themselves to one another for very nearly a year before we can inflict mankind upon them. So, you are invited to opening ceremonies, about roughly spoken 5 to 6 years from now. We close with this statement from our Governor. He applauds Iowa Child for sending a strong and bold message. We’re doing something different and better than the rest of the County. To reflect the national legs of a project like this, I still have not met the reporter who somehow picked up the telephone and called our Governor to ask this question. But the article was picked up by newspapers across America. Phoenix, Scottsdale, Texas, Florida, Washington, San Francisco, the Wall Street Journal did an article on it. This thing grabbed people’s attention in a way that Iowa can utilize to our fabulous educational and economic benefit. Ladies and gentlemen, we can go on for some time like this. We’ve condensed the educational portion way down. We are at your service to answer any questions the Board may have. A specific request we would have is, as a part of our application to the vision Iowa Fund, which we expect to make sometime in February, we would ask for a letter of recommendation or letter of support from this Board. We believe it carries zero risk and zero cost. If you believe this is the sort of future you’d like to have for your area and your community and your County, we would ask you to make that statement and we can include it with all of the others that we’ll use when submitting for the Vision Iowa Funding. Thank you very much. What questions may we answer?

Lehman: Does the Board have any questions? I appreciate your presentation and the energy that you bring to this project. I’ve seen it presented. This is the first time in person.

Townsend: Good. Thank you.

Lehman: I know you’ve had many questions and I’m sure we’ll have further questions. But, with our involvement with members of the community, as far as the city councils, Chamber of Commerce and the Iowa City Area Development we’ve had some correspondence and there will be questions to be asked as you develop. I know this thing is a growing project. Everything is nailed down.

Townsend: It gets better every day. If I may be perfectly direct, a good deal of what you’ve seen here today, and a lot of what you haven’t seen, are great suggestions that have come out of audiences and from the general public. Our job for 5 years, we believe, has been to listen. We do not represent ourselves as professional educators; we have no profit motive whatsoever. To be even more direct, it’s cost us a fortune to get this project where it stands now. We have no chance whatsoever of earning back one dime, but we believe in this, and the growing number of people across Iowa and around the nation that believe in it is really quite dramatic, and we’re eager to have your support in bringing it to Coralville and Johnson County.

Stutsman: This letter of support that you’re asking for, just a support of the concept, or an agreement of financial support from the County?

Townsend: We do not request one dime of financial support from Johnson County. How about that?

Stutsman: So it’s basically that the Board of Supervisors support the concept?

Townsend: Exactly right. We do not have the power of the inclination to force this onto anyone. The community that hosts it must want it, and we’d ask you to make some sort of expression to the Vision Iowa Board that you’re supportive of the idea, and eager to help to participate in creating it. But it’s not a financial request, we promise.

Thompson: I know that you probably consolidated your report in the interests of time…

Townsend: Lots.

Thompson: …and we appreciate that, but you mentioned that teacher training was one of you major goals. I wondered if you could just briefly describe what connection you’re going to have with the teacher training departments at the University.

Townsend: Thank you for asking the question. Frankly, we enjoy the education discussion way more than the economic development. I’m not in this to build a tourist attraction that I don’t control or own. I would like to visit it. But education has been the motivation from the very beginning here. Teacher training is not just a part of this project; it is the point of the Iowa Child, and frankly, the economic development that comes with tourism is great, one could build a rain forest tourist attraction and have people come see it, but I don’t want to do that. There’s no point to that, in my mind, without the education. Teacher training, these words sound almost overwhelming sometimes, but I reflect the views of every professional educator we’ve encountered, including most parents. It’s the most critical need out there. The fact that we can make a statement, and we’ve been doing this for 5 years now, and somewhere around 450 presentations, tens of thousands of individuals in the audience in person. When we make a statement that says nowhere on earth does any full school district, you can find the occasional individual school, but does any full school district deliver a useful understanding in those 5 areas of learning expertise we described earlier. That’s a frightening statement, yet never once has it been challenged. Early in the game, every time I said it I was prepared to duck from the tomatoes, and nobody ever threw one, because they all agree. You know what? For all the love, money, time, effort, devotion expended by great teachers, great parents attempting to impact the world of education, everybody has to unfortunately agree that those 5 areas are not successfully being taught to very many people. And yet, the world knows how to do most of this teaching. One quick example I would use. Among the 5, one is health and fitness. I would submit that every person in this room, right this moment, could write down a fitness regimen that would keep a human being healthy from 0-100. And yet, simultaneously, it’s also true that the percentage of America’s graduation high school seniors deemed clinically obese is in the 30s and rising annually. Now how can those 2 things both be facts simultaneously? It’s because our system does not get the understanding and the lifestyle habits inculcated in children across the board, early in life, where they can use them throughout life. Facilities like this will learn how to use the understanding of how we acquire knowledge to teach teachers how to teach health and fitness. The same is true for all 5 of those. Teacher training is the point of this project, and everything I’ve described today will be linked electronically and through modern technology methods, to every teacher, every classroom, every home in Iowa.

Stutsman: Will this be set up as a private non-profit organization?

Townsend: Precisely. The Iowa Child Foundation began as a private not-for-profit foundation. It’s evolved into a public not-for-profit foundation. I may have misled you there just for a moment. The Iowa Child Institute is a public not-for-profit, qualified by the United States Government, with all the appropriate things it requires to be one of those. But the school itself is clearly targeting public education. This is not a private, elitist school in any fashion.

Stutsman: Who would be going to this school? I read a little bit in the paper, they’d come from all over?

Townsend: Essentially all over, assuming the kids can get home for dinner. We don’t see this as a boarding school. Iowans in Sioux City will not be attending. They’ll visit, to be sure, and the entire hotel will have a range of prices, so that some of the rooms are more, frankly, spartan and dormitory-like, so kids and students and teachers and parents from around the state can in fact come visit overnight. Perhaps they come for a week. Imagine a class from Anita, Iowa, coming to visit the facility and being able to afford to spend a week there. Now while the kids are learning everything there is to learn in the rain forest aquarium environment, their teachers and their local administrators are off in the teaching training facility learning all the latest methods of teaching that they collectively take back to their home community. So where specifically do the students come from? The surrounding area. The specifics of how they’ll get selected? First of all, I personally will not be the one to decide that, and I will not decide what’s taught here. This is not Ted’s private little school. That’s the first thing. But professional educators, probably led by people from the existing universities, Tom Sweitzer, Dean of Education at UNI, is on our Board of Directors and a very solid supporter. He’s working with other educational leadership types, ultimately to include all the colleges and universities of our state, to create the answers to all these very appropriate questions. An analogy that might be utilized here, I’m also on the Board of what’s called the BEA, the Business Educational Alliance in Des Moines. They help run the downtown school of Des Moines, on our skywalk. It was recognized a couple of months ago by Working Mother magazine as one of the 10 best great schools in America. They use a lottery system. It’s not a pure lottery system. If you have a child in the school already, and a sibling comes up a year or 2 later, there’s a slightly increased chance that that 2nd name will get pulled out of the hat. But they emphasize diversity, they emphasize geographic diversity as well. If the kids live close enough to get home for dinner, they have a chance to attend. This is true what I described here about students in the pre K-5 range. There will be a full-day public working grade school in this facility. It also needs to impact teachers and students at the middle- and high-school levels, so we’ve been counseled by the education professionals that those folks need to come each day as well, but not as full-time students. The local middle and high schools would stay right where they are, of course, that is the students would continue to attend there, but the older the kids get, the easier it is to transport them. The young ones need to stay in one place. The middle and high schoolers can come for a half-day. A group from the local high school could come in the morning, go back. Afternoon, there might be a different group, and the same would be true of the middle schools. But again, the thing I would emphasize on all these education questions, I am not the answer man, we’re the first voice. So the people on our education and leadership design team are in the process as we speak of defining all these specific interactions that are obviously quite key. But the basic commitment is to build some facility that advances teacher training in Iowa and beyond.

Thompson: Mr. Townsend, I know that some environmental organizations have voiced some concerns about this. Has there been any review of this by any of the state environmental departments?

Townsend: So many of the world-class, professional environmentalists and ecological experts are involved, that my hope is that in time the people who had those concerns will come not just to accept this project, but embrace it and make it their own. In terms of delivering the message of ecological literacy, our full intention is for this facility to set a new standard of teaching and expressing that need, and it is critical in Iowa and around the world. We hope they’ll come to see this as the best delivery mechanism for their message they every imagined. I would submit, without knowing any particular individuals or their backgrounds, that the books many of such folks, including myself, have read to learn about this subject. They have been written by the people doing this job.

Stutsman: Why a rain forest and not something that’s more…

Townsend: Iowan.

Stutsman: Yes, Iowa.

Townsend: We hear the question quite frequently, and first of all, this is not a threat in any way to the Iowa prairie. There are a couple of reasons. The idea of the rainforest aquarium with life-science exhibits, that package, is unique in the world. It does not exist today. It delivers a remarkable attraction, but it came not because we had a desire to build a tourist attraction. It became because that’s the environment described by the professional educators as the most effective learning environment they could envision. They want the diversity and the complexity and the interactions that come with understanding how a real rainforest works. It also emphasizes the threat to the rainforests around the world, because it is quite dramatic indeed. The numbers vary depending on the sources, but this source of life on earth, if you will, is being destroyed at the rate of nearly 100 acres per minute. I’ve been in Africa, and I’ve been in South America, and I’ve seen these things happen, and it’s not a pretty sight. It’s quite ugly. The world needs to learn this message, and this facility will deliver it in a way that’s broader and more powerful than any that’s out there existing today.

Thompson: I’m having trouble getting a picture in my mind of the size of this. I’ve been to the one in Oklahoma City.

Townsend: You know, I haven’t seen Oklahoma City.

Thompson: Could you describe it in football fields?

Townsend: 3. About 3 football fields. And how tall?

Thompson: 20 stories.

Lehman: That’s the building itself, and then you have parking, motels, and…

Thompson: And the rain forest, the part that arches, that didn’t look like 20 stories on your picture. Is that part 20 stories?

Townsend: I hate having to say this, but I’m in a position where I must tell you I’m not really proud of that picture, but I know up here what it will look like, and I promise you, it’s a 5-acre footprint, with 20 stories tall. That does not include the hotel, the teacher training center, the ancillary facilities, the opportunities around it.

Stutsman: So that’s just the rainforest?

Townsend: That’s rainforest, aquarium, and life science exhibits, and grade school.

Lehman: Right now you’ve got approximately 80 acres designated for this location.

Townsend: The full-site development of this location that Coralville has so generously brought forward is not up to us, entirely, of course. Coralville and yourself, the local leadership, must be involved in what happens on the rest of the site. But it’s quite a dramatic location, and I believe Coralville as a community has under control about 80 acres, yes.

Stutsman: You bring up a good point that I wanted to ask, too. You say local leadership will decide. When will we be involved in that? You know, this is the first exposure the Board of Supervisors has had to this project.

Townsend: Sure. Well, what our approach has been for 5 years is to build collaborations and coalitions, and you have the opportunity and are indeed are quite welcome to be involved in any way at any time you’d like. We started, of course, with the people who were most closely affiliated with the location. Then on top of that, to be more direct, we thought it was important to discuss the project with the people who were sources of financing first, and since we weren’t asking Johnson County to participate financially. But, having said that, you have every opportunity that you’d like. There are all kinds of meetings; this is what we do all day, every day, and design teams, and education, science, technology, site planning. We would ask your suggestions on how you’d like to be involved, because we don’t exclude anyone.

Harney: I personally am more interested in the educational value of this than anything else, I mean, as far as the tourist portion of it goes. As I understand it, am I correct in understanding you that there will be select students come to that as a classroom setting? There would not be a full-time student setting, other than the lower grades?

Townsend: Right. In grade school, they come full-time. The first graders will have the Iowa, I don’t know these titles exactly, but the school at Iowa Child, some group of 300 or so grade-school kids will have that as their home school all day, every day, for their 5 or 6 years in school. Middle-schoolers will go to the local middle schools just as they do now, but have an opportunity, this is what the educators are describing as we speak, but have the opportunity to visit the facility to incorporate all these learning technologies and techniques, and the science of the mind, and in the rainforest learning environment. They are easier to transport, so they come part days.

Harney: So they would get their normal education, just as they would at any other school except there’s going to be more science and ecology-oriented (inaudible).

Townsend: Precisely. Saying it another way, it works much more readily with the young kids. The other end of the spectrum, it’s hard to envision this particular school having a football team. Those sorts of things need to occur right where they’re occurring today.

Thompson: I have a question for Henry. This land is already incorporated into Coralville, right?

Herwig: That’s correct.

Thompson: Could you say where it touches on the proposed James Avenue, and talk a little bit about sewer and water, and other infrastructure out there?

Herwig: James Avenue (inaudible).

Townsend: Oakdale Boulevard, maybe, or?

Stutsman: No.

Thompson: Well, Oakdale will run into it, but what street will border it? I mean, won’t there have to be a North-South Street that goes past it?

Herwig: It fits pretty well within it. You’ve got that slide?

Townsend: We’ll see. I usually just advance these slides; I don’t reverse them frequently.

Herwig: The West Land Use Planning Exercises that we had a lot of the infrastructure laid out, and so forth. It fits in with that. It’ll be just south of the extension of Oakdale Boulevard, approximately roughly about halfway between 965 and 380. That’s about where it’s at. I think there’s arterials on either side, either the east and the west.

Thompson: Oh, OK.

Townsend: But they may be subject to change out there, obviously. We haven’t absorbed the entire impact of how it relates into the area, completely.

Thompson: So those are in your 5-year road plan? Of what corresponds to our 5-year road plan?

Townsend: I’d have had this up there if Kirk was doing it.

Thompson: So the access road is Oakdale. Would be extended into the…no…it would run on the north?

Townsend: That’s the first thinking, but there are a lot of people involved in the further site development, and the thing that we’d like you to think of today is that ingress and egress need to be perfect. It’s got to be easy for the local community, it’s got to be easy out there. But that, I believe, is yet another great opportunity that comes with this particular site. It doesn’t have to be forced in anywhere. The major impact is already out there on this interstate system. A remarkable number of cars pass through there every day. They don’t have to come into this community if you don’t want them to. Now, I think you’re going to want them to, because economic impact is fabulous. Another thing that’s true about the site is, under the circumstances, it’s currently a bean field, and part of it’s corn field, I guess. But it’s going to be developed one way or another. If Iowa Child evaporates today, that site still will not be agricultural 5 years from today. So it’s going to change that in terms of coming into a community with minimal negative impact. It’s very clean, it’s a non-polluting facility, it creates wonderful high-quality jobs in the world of education and science and technology, and yet it happens very easily in the Coralville/Iowa City area. We don’t have to displace anybody.

Stutsman: When you open, the grand opening, will everything be open, the school, everything is targeted to start at the same time?

Townsend: Absolutely. That’s one of the key aspects of this project is that everything we’ve described here is a unit. You can’t phase this project. It’s a seamless, coherent entity. It’s not a row or a stack of buildings. Now, ultimately, you can see additions coming, and aspects around it, whatever the City of Coralville decides and you decide you’d like to have as corollary facilities. One that we recommend heartily; it’s not our deal, but we sure think it’s a good idea, is some sort of professional educator’s park, you might call it. The research triangle in North Carolina, people of for-profit and therefore tax-paying businesses will want to affiliate with geographic proximity. So some way, somehow, there’s 2,200 acres to work with and the rest of your whole community, it would be great if some sort of opportunity was created to attract tax-paying businesses from the world of education. Education is a colossal industry, better than 15% of America’s gross domestic product. That’s 9 and a half trillion dollars, the last we heard. Better than 15% is spent directly on teachers and their administrators. One person in 12 in America is employed as a teacher or an administrator. And yet, people don’t think of education as an industry. You don’t talk about what profit we made in the grade school this year. And yet, it’s a colossal profit-making opportunity for the community that decides education can define their future. And again, in terms of describing an industry, education fits this area dramatically. With the educational institutions already here, this corridor concept explodes into true meaning: University of Iowa, Northern Iowa, Kirkwood, the local Prairie City, the local community colleges, Clear Creek Amana, Iowa City, these people are all involved and excited about collaborating and defining a new level of educational excellence. From that commitment, remarkable economic impact will flow. Thank you, folks. Anytime you’d like to have us back, call us back. We’re at your service; this is what we do. We want to be certain that you’re comfortable in every step of the way.

Lehman: I appreciate your taking the time for the presentation. Very enjoyable. Thank you. We’ll recess now, for a break.

Recessed at 10:20 a.m.; reconvened at 10:35 a.m.

(Continued in Part 2)